(9c) Sustainable Manufacturing and Life Cycle Assessment of MOF-Polymer Composites By Reactive Extrusion

Over the past decades, significant research has shown that manufacturing MOF-polymer composites is a promising strategy for improving its practical adaptability in storage, separation, and catalysis applications since unshaped MOF powders are not appropriate for deployment in engineering processes. However, there are some gaps between laboratory-synthesized and commercial-deployed MOF-polymer composites: most MOFs are synthesized in lab in milligram/gram scale under batch reactions and are then used to manufacture composites in a discontinuous process; it requires a large volume of hazardous solvents during the solvothermal synthesis, which posts more environmental issues and increases material costs. In this work, we propose a continuously one-step, rapid, and solvent-free approach to manufacture MOF-polymer composite directly from solid reagents (polymer matrix, metal irons, and ligands) via extrusion that can reach a few kilograms per hour scale compared with conventional method in grams/batch/day. For the first time, this environmental-friendly approach has been demonstrated in a case study of ZIF-67 using Process 11 parallel twin-screw extruder. Further LCA studies focus on identifying and studying the sustainability of MOF technology, specifically the potential industrial production at large scales. By comparing the production of 1 kg ZIF-67, reactive extrusion exhibits several orders of magnitude (~3-5) lower than solvothermal reaction in terms of environmental and health impacts.